Monday, 24 April 2017

Dr Vaughan, Dr Williams and Dom Sebastian

This post is not exactly a sequel to the last, but it continues on a similar theme. On Sunday 23 April, the annual Henry Vaughan Memorial Service took place at Llansantffraed Church near Brecon. In recent years, I've made an effort to attend on behalf of the Sassoon Fellowship, but this year was a particularly significant occasion, for two main reasons, the first being that it marked the official opening of the new Visitor Area inside the church, towards which the SSF made a modest financial contribution. The new information panels include a mention of Sassoon's visit - of course - and his poem "At the Grave of Henry Vaughan", which is read out at the graveside each year by Wendy Camp during the wreath-laying ceremony that follows the main part of the service.

The Usk Valley, near Llansantffraed

The other significant point about this year's service was the fact that the SSF, for the first time, became an active part of the wreath-laying ceremony. The Brecknock Society's wreath was laid by Glyn Mathias, OBE, former TV journalist and the son of Roland Mathias (1915-2007), renowned local writer and critic who, as it happens, also wrote a poem on the subject of the grave, though his is less well-known than Sassoon's. Our wreath was made and laid by Anne Penton, the great-niece of David C Thomas - who was himself an old boy of the local public school, Christ College, Brecon.

The presence of Dr Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury, who, as he put it, "cut the metaphoric ribbon" to open the Visitor Area, made this an even more special occasion. The Visitor Area is not in its final form at the moment as the information panels are not set up in their final location, which will include a stand displaying copies of works by and about Vaughan.

Dr Williams also gave the address, taking as his subject the theme of "Life as relation: Vaughan's images of reconciled living". Beginning with the poem "Quickness" (in its archaic sense of "being alive"), he took us on a whistle-stop tour of Vaughan's ideas on the subject, which gave me pause for thought simply because these are very close to the concept of "mindfulness" which is so much in vogue in the 21st century. Many are following the lead of Eckhart Tolle, whose 1997 book, The Power of Now, is so much more than just another best-selling self-help manual, and are practising the discipline so ably taught by individuals such as Jon Kabat-Zinn.

Dom Sebastian Moore, who gave Siegfried Sassoon his instruction in the Roman Catholic faith, was a great admirer of Tolle, as I have discovered while reading his own exploration of faith, The Contagion of Jesus. Dom Sebastian was awaiting final publication of this book at the time I interviewed him in 2007. He talked to me about how it had come into existence as a result of a friend having collated a series of essays and sermons he had written over a long period and linked them into distinct strands of thought. At that time, because of my lack of knowledge of Catholicism, I had little idea of the content of the book. He did not mention Tolle, nor could he have mentioned him to Siegfried Sassoon during their acquaintance; Tolle was only 19 when Sassoon died.

So it was a pleasant surprise, after returning from the service, to return to The Contagion of Jesus and find Sebastian quoting Rowan Williams. Whether his ideas were completely in tune with Dr Williams's ideas, I cannot verify, but it's clear that Dr Williams sees Henry Vaughan as having had a revelation similar to that experienced by Eckhart Tolle. It just goes to show that there are no new ideas under the sun, just ideas which haven't previously received the appreciation they deserve. Henry Vaughan was well ahead of his time, and this helps to explain the ongoing revival of his reputation.